Before Hurricane Katrina hit land, a televised news report
said that officials were warning that anyone who abandoned their animals
would be charged with animal cruelty. Since animals are usually the last
thing that government officials, and the news media, concern themselves
with, it was encouraging to see a preemptive attempt to protect potential
animal victims.

An unknown number of people risked their own lives by
staying with their animals, and that too was encouraging to see, though it
brought to mind the importance of increasing the numbers of shelters that
would allow animals, and increasing attempts to get such information out
to animal guardians that there are shelters that will help.

What was discouraging is how many stories are now emerging
about people that were forced to make a choice between abandoning their
animals in order to be allowed to enter a shelter set up for humans, or
risking their own lives by remaining outside of the shelter with their
animals. How can officials tell someone they must abandon their animals
after stating that such abandonment would mean charges of animal cruelty?

It is estimated that 60 percent of the U.S. population has
a companion animal. Eighty percent of that 60 percent have two or more
companion animals. And yet shelters for humans don't take that into
account - there are no contingencies for the furred, feathered, or scaled
members of people's families which have proven to be medically and
psychologically beneficial for their people. And if there was ever a time
when people need the soothing and stabilizing effect that an animal can
give, it's when they have lost everything they own, and their lives are in
upheaval, such as the victims of Katrina.

How difficult would it be for the Red Cross and the
Salvation Army to join hands with the HSUS, the ASPCA, and other animal
aid organizations who could supply crates/cages to be available at every
Red Cross/Salvation Army shelter, along with food for the animals. If
there were people that didn't want to be around the crated animals, they
could even have non-animal sections of the shelters.

Nothing made the need for disaster shelter reform more
evident than the story seen on CNN of a small white poodle-type dog,
standing on his hind legs, with front paws on the outside of an evacuation
bus' closed door, begging to be allowed aboard. One can only guess if this
was Snowball who had been taken away from a small boy as he got on an
evacuation bus, as the child reportedly screamed for his dog. That dog
didn't have a Snowball's chance in Hell.

Please, send your donations to your favorite group,
whether that be the HSUS or the Red Cross, or whoever - but include a
request that those groups helping people, and those groups helping
animals, ban together and help the entire family, which include both
people and their companion animals.

You can help by donating to the following groups - check
their websites for updates:

** Fair Use Notice**
This document may contain copyrighted material, use of which has not been
specifically authorized by the copyright owners. I believe that this
not-for-profit, educational use on the Web constitutes a fair use of the
copyrighted material (as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright
Law). If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your
own that go beyond fair use, you must obtain permission from the copyright
owner.